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THE CROWNING OF PETRARCH.

Among the great men to whom we owe the resuscitation of science, Petrarch deserves the foremost place; and his enthusiastic attachment to this great cause constitutes his most just and splendid title to the gratitude of posterity. He was the votary of literature. He loved it with a perfect love. He worshipped it with an almost fanatical devotion. He was the missionary who proclaimed its discoveries to distant countries-the pilgrim who travelled far and wide to collect its relics-the hermit who retired to seclusion to meditate on its beauties-the champion who fought its battles-the conqueror who, in more than a metaphorical sense, led barbarism and ignorance in triumph, and received in the capitol the laurel which his magnificent victory had earned.

Nothing can be conceived more affecting or noble than that ceremony. The superb palaces and porticos, by which had rolled the ivory chariots of Marius and Cæsar, had long mouldered into dust. The laurelled fasces, the golden eagles, the shouting legions, the captives, and the pictured cities were indeed wanting to his victorious procession. The sceptre had passed away from Rome. But she still retained the mightier influence of an intellectual empire, and was now to confer the prouder reward of an intellectual triumph. To the man who had extended the dominion of her ancient language-who had erected the trophies of philosophy and imagination in the haunts of ignorance and ferocity-whose captives were the hearts of admiring nations, enchained by the influence of his songwhose spoils were the treasures of ancient genius rescued from obscurity and decay-the Eternal City offered the just and glorious tribute of her gratitude. Amidst the ruined monuments of ancient, and the infant erections of modern art, he who had restored the broken link between the two ages of human civilization was crowned with the wreath which he had deserved from the moderns who owed to him their refinement-from the ancients who owed to him their fame. Never was a coronation so august witnessed by Westminste or Rheims.

BOOKS AND EDUCATION IN CHARLES SECOND'S REIGN.

Literature which could be carried by the post bag then formed the greater part of the intellectual nutriment ruminated by the country divines and country justices. The difficulty and expense of conveying large packets from place to place were so great, that an extensive work was longer in making its way from Paternoster Row to Devonshire or Lancashire, than it now is in reaching Kentucky. How scantily a rural parsonage was then furnished, even with books the most necessary to a theologian, has already been remarked

The houses of the gentry were not more plentifully supplied. Few knights of the shire had libraries so good as may now perpetually be found in a servant's hall, or in the back parlor of a small shopkeeper. An esquire passed among his neighbors for a great scholar, if Hudibras and Baker's Chronicle, Tarlton's Jests and the Seven Champions of Christendom, lay in his hall window among the fishing-rods and fowling-pieces. No circulating library, no book society then existed, even in the capital; but in the capital those students who could not afford to purchase largely had a resource. The shops of the great booksellers, near St. Paul's Churchyard, were crowded every day and all day long with readers; and a known customer was often permitted to carry a volume home. In the country there was no such accommodation; and every man was under the necessity of buying whatever he wished to read.1

As to the lady of the manor and her daughters, their literary stores generally consisted of a prayer-book and a receipt-book. But in truth they lost little by living in rural seclusion. For, even in the highest ranks, and in those situations which afforded the greatest facilities for mental improvement, the English women of that generation were decidedly worse educated than they have been at any other time since the revival of learning. At an earlier period, they had studied the masterpieces of ancient genius. In the present day, they seldom bestow much attention on the dead languages; but they are familiar with the tongue of Pascal and Molière, with the tongue of Dante and Tasso, with the tongue of Goethe and Schiller; nor is there any purer or more graceful English than that which accomplished women now speak and write. But, during the latter part of the seventeenth century, the culture of the female mind seems to have been almost entirely neglected. If a damsel had the least smattering of literature, she was regarded as a prodigy. Ladies highly born, highly bred, and naturally quick-witted, were unable to write a line in their mother-tongue without solecisms and faults of spelling such as a charity girl would now be ashamed to commit.2

The explanation may easily be found. Extravagant licentiousness, the natural effect of extravagant austerity, was now the mode; and licentiousness had produced its ordinary effect, the moral and intellectual degradation of women. To their personal beauty it was the fashion to pay rude and impudent homage. But the admiration

1 Cotton seems, from his Angler, to have found room for his whole library in his hall window; and Cotton was a man of letters. Even when Franklin first visited London, in 1724, circulating libraries were unknown there. The crowd at the booksellers' shops in Little Britain is mentioned by Roger North in his Life of his brother John.

* One instance will suffice. Queen Mary had good natural abilities, had been educated by n bishop, was fond of history and poetry, and was regarded by very eminent men as a súperior woman. There is, in the library of the Hague, a superb English Bible, which was delivered to her when she was crowned in Westminster Abbey. In the title page are these words, in het own hand:-"This book was given the King and I, at our crow nation. Marie R."

and desire which they inspired were seldom mingled with respect, with affection, or with any chivalrous sentiment. The qualities which fit them to be companions, advisers, confidential friends, rather repelled than attracted the libertines of Whitehall. In such circumstances, the standard of female attainments was necessarily low; and it was more dangerous to be above that standard than to be beneath it. Extreme ignorance and frivolity were thought less unbecoming in a lady than the slightest tincture of pedantry.

ALFRED TENNYSON, 1810.

ALFRED TENNYSON, the present poet laureate of England, is the son of a clergyman of Lincolnshire, and was born about the year 1810. He went through the usual routine of a university education at Trinity College, Cambridge, and since then has lived a life of retirement. There is nothing particularly eventful in his biography, and beyond a very small circle it is said he is seldom met. In 1830, he first appeared as an author, by publishing a small volume of verses which was succeeded by a second volume, three years afterward. In 1843 appeared his two volumes, including many of his former productions, considerably altered, with the addition of many new ones. His more recent publications are "The Princess, a Medley,"-the largest and most ambitious of his works,'-and "In Memoriam," which may be said to be the most characteristic. The latter is a tribute to his departed friend, Arthur H. Hallam, a son of the celebrated historian, to whom he was bound by many endearing ties, and who was on the point of marrying the poet's sister, when he sickened and died.

As a poet, Tennyson, like Wordsworth, has divided the critics; and here, as in most cases, the truth is not to be found in either extreme. While some of his minor pieces are truly beautiful and interest the feelings, and while we find, here and there, a gem in his larger productions, it must be acknowledged that much of what he has written is quaint, speculative, affected, and enigmatical.2 Among the beauties which atone for these faults, the "May Queen" stands out in prominent relief, for its simple and natural truthfulness, and touching pathos. It is, however, so generally known, having been brought before the public in so

The subject of the "Princess" relates to a certain philosophical princess, who founded a college of women, to be educated in high contempt for the male sex. This royal champion of "women's rights" has been betrothed to a neighboring prince, and the poet, assuming the character of this prince, narrates the tale. "As a poem," says Mr. Moir, "its beauties and faults are so inextricably interwoven, and the latter are so glaring and many, that, as a sincere admirer of the genius of Tennyson, I could almost wish it had remained unwritten. I admit the excellence of particular passages; but it has neither general harmony of design nor sustained merit of execution."

2 Some of his critics are to me as enigmatical as the poet himself. For instance, the author of the "Illustrious Personages of the Nineteenth Century" says, in his praise, (I presume,) "He can gather up his strength like a serpent, in the gleaming coil of a line, or dart it out straight and free." I candidly confess I know not what this means, as applied to poetry.

Read notices of Tennyson's works in "Gentleman's Magazine," Feb. 1848; "North British Review," ix. 43, and xiii. 473; "Edinburgh," lxxvii. 373; and "London Quarterly," lxx. 385.

many ways, that I refrain from quoting it. But the following pieces favorably represent him:

LADY CLARA VERE DE VERE.

Lady Clara Vere de Vere,

Of me you shall not win renown;
You thought to break a country heart
For pastime, ere you went to town.
At me you smiled, but unbeguiled

I saw the snare, and I retired:
The daughter of a hundred earls-
You are not one to be desired.

Lady Clara Vere de Vere,

I know you proud to bear your name;
Your pride is yet no mate for mine,

Too proud to care from whence I came.
Nor would I break, for your sweet sake,
A heart that doats on truer charms:
A simple maiden in her flower

Is worth a hundred coats-of-arms.
Lady Clara Vere de Vere;

Some meeker pupil you must find;
For were you queen of all that is,

I could not stoop to such a mind.
You sought to prove how I could love,
And my disdain is my reply;
The lion on your old stone gates
Is not more cold to you than I.

Lady Clara Vere de Vere,

You put strange memories in my head:
Not thrice your branching limes have blown
Since I beheld young Laurence dead.
Oh, your sweet eyes, your low replies-
A great enchantress you may be;
But there was that across his throat
Which you had hardly cared to see.

Lady Clara Vere de Vere,

When thus he met his mother's view,
She had the passions of her kind

She spake some certain truths you.

Indeed, I heard one bitter word

That scarce is fit for you to hear:

Her manners had not that repose

Which stamps the caste of Vere de Vere.

Lady Clara Vere de Vere,

There stands a spectre in your hall!
The guilt of blood is at your door!

You changed a wholesome heart to gall!
You held your course without remorse,
To make him trust his modest worth,
And, last, you fix'd a vacant stare,
And slew him with your noble birth.

Trust me, Clara Vere de Vere,

From yon blue heavens above us bent The gardener Adam and his wife

Smile at the claims of long descent. Howe'er it be, it seems to me,

'Tis only noble to be good;
Kind hearts are more than coronets,
And simple faith than Norman blood.

I know you, Clara Vere de Vere,—
You pine among your halls and towers;
The languid light of your proud eyes

Is wearied of the rolling hours.

In glowing health, with boundless wealth,
But sickening of a vague disease,

You know so ill to deal with Time,

You needs must play such pranks as these.

Clara, Clara Vere de Vere,

If Time be heavy on your hands, Are there no beggars at your gate, Nor any poor about your lands? Oh! teach the orphan-boy to read,

Or teach the orphan-girl to sew; Pray Heaven for a human heart, And let the foolish yeoman go.

THE LORD OF BURLEIGH.

In her ear he whispers gayly,

"If my heart by signs can tell, Maiden, I have watch'd thee daily,

And I think thou lovest me well."
She replies, in accents fainter,
"There is none I love like thee."
He is but a landscape-painter,
And a village maiden she.
He to lips, that fondly falter,

Presses his without reproof;
Leads her to the village altar,

And they leave her father's roof. "I can make no marriage present; Little can I give my wife.

Love will make our cottage pleasant,
And I love thee more than life."

They by parks and lodges going
See the lordly castles stand:

Summer woods, about them blowing,
Made a murmur in the land.
From deep thought himself he rouses,
Says to her that loves him well,
"Let us see these handsome houses
Where the wealthy nobles dwell."
So she goes, by him attended,
Hears him lovingly converse,

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